The Precipitating Events Sequence
by hanet
Summary: Howard/Raj drabbles
1. Reactants

**1. I took a chance to get you alone**

A minor incident at Raj's. It was meaningless, accidental. Raj grabbed for the controller just as Howard's fingers closed around it.

Their eyes refused to meet. It was no big deal. Heated faces. The words 'ersatz homosexual marriage' clattering noisily in Raj's head.

They studiously ignored it. When the game started, Raj got the first kill. Howard gritted his teeth and got into the game.

Half an hour later, Raj was standing on his coffee table in his socks, Howard jumping on the couch, both shouting wildly and trying to shoot each other.

They both felt it was emphatically heterosexual.

**2. Dreams are the real thing**

Two A.M., New Year's Eve, and Raj was drunk. Penny's apartment was empty of all the meatheads and bimbos. Leonard and Sheldon were at the hospital with Howard, who, despite previous negative experiences, had consumed nuts tonight.

Raj lay on the couch, thoroughly wasted. Penny glanced at him fondly between picking up red plastic beer cups. Put two or three drinks in Raj, he was a jerk. Put seven or eight in him, and he was hilarious. Put ten or eleven in him, and he collapsed unconscious and snored adorably.

It was a quiet murmur, but Penny heard it: "Howard."

**3. You fill up my day**

His mother was out shopping. Their house was uncharacteristically silent. Howard sat on his bed cross-legged in the pressing aloneness of the quiet. He felt lost in his own home. He should go out, he should call someone, he should do something. Ideas skipped across the surface of his thoughts but refused to submerge.

He followed his first instinct. On the phone to Raj: "Hey buddy! Wha'dya say we head over to the comic book store later, huh?"

Of course, Raj agreed.

It wasn't Wednesday. Leonard and Sheldon wouldn't be there.

For some unnameable reason, it was better that way.

**4. The use and abuse of masks**

Raining. They sat across from one another at Starbucks.

Raj's clenched jaw. "I'm not your boyfriend."

"I didn't say you were!"

"Sounded like it," Raj said sharply.

"I just suggested that it might be better if I moved in."

Softening. "We _do _like all the same things."

"I have to get out of my mother's house." Howard sounded desperate.

"We're putting a separate bed for you in my computer room," Raj warned. He refused to analyze his feelings about this.

Howard wrinkled his nose, considering the alternative. "Fine by me."

An ersatz homosexual relationship was better than none at all.

**5. Eventually, you'll understand I love you**

Two months later, in the darkness of Raj's bedroom. Howard and Raj, a little drunk, were tangled in the blankets, urgent and frantic.

"I didn't see this coming, did you?" Howard breathed between hard kisses.

"Hell no," lied Raj, trying to keep his brain shut off.

"But I'm… I'm such a ladies man," Howard continued when his mouth was not occupied by Raj's. He sounded incredulous.

A sardonic grunt was Raj's response.

"This is… so weird…" By this he meant he would be horrified if anyone knew he was kissing a man right now.

"Howard?"

"Mm?"

"Shut the hell up."


	2. Products

**1. In which Raj searches for gay porn.**

Nothing had transpired beyond some extremely testosterone fuelled make-out sessions and a few other occasions which were embarrassing and cause for Just Rolling Over and Going to Sleep. It was frustrating not to _know_ more. It was confusing.

Raj waited until Howard left the apartment. He sort of dreaded searching for what he needed to search for, but he entered his key terms anyway.

Websites popped up. More than Raj even expected, which was a lot. He narrowed his eyes at the screen in chagrin. Many of the links were already purple.

Howard should learn to erase his search history.

**2. In which Howard realizes he's a homo now.***

Howard rolled over in his sleep, spooning Raj. Morning was starting to trickle through the windows in Raj's bedroom. Howards hand drifted underneath Raj's Hulk t-shirt, feeling upwards but finding no purchase.

Raj elbowed Howard in the gut. "What the hell, man? I'm not a chick!"

Howard, horrified, sat up too quickly and fell off the bed. "What? What? Raj! I'm sorry!" He struggled with the sheets, emerging skinny and sleep-tousled. He stood beside Raj's bed looking contrite and tired.

Raj covered his head with his pillow. "You haven't even been with enough women for that to be a habit."

**3. In which Raj (finally) jumps Howard's bones.**

The room is dark and Raj has finally figured out how this all works and stopped being totally grossed out about it. They're kissing and Raj likes how insatiable Howard always is. Still, it doesn't make it any easier. Raj doesn't even know how to start.

A hand beneath Green Lantern boxers, the indelicate opening of Raj's beside table drawer, a bottle of, "Oh my god, I can't believe you actually bought—" and Raj's hand over Howard's mouth.

"Shut up," Raj mutters.

Thing is, whether Raj brings a man or a woman home, his bed creaks just the same.

**4. In which Howard and Raj discover showersex.**

"I told you it wasn't a good idea!" Raj shouts. He's on his ass in his bathroom, sitting on the shower curtain, which came tumbling with him when he fell out of the bathtub. Howard was still laughing at him, standing beneath the unchecked cascade of water.

Howard turns the water off and climbs out of the tub, all shivering and skinny limbs. He gets on top of Raj and they are both wet and slippery. "I think," Howard says, voice sexy and low, "that it was a _very_ good idea." He even waggles his eyebrows.

"…you're a frickin' jackass."

**5. In which they decide to tell everyone… eventually.**

"I kind of… don't want to," Howard said. They were in bed, naked. It wasn't cuddling, per se. It was a good deal more manly than that.

Raj shrugged. "Well, I'll tell Leonard. You have to tell Penny, for obvious reasons."

"What, you think I won't need to be drunk for this? I'll need to be drunk for this."

"Well if you're going to be drunk anyway, then _you_ can be the one who tells Sheldon."

There was a horrified silence as they both contemplated that debacle.

"… you know, they don't need to know yet, right?"

"Oh, hell no."

* * *

* A/N: The concept for drabble nombre deux was sort of artistically lifted from Rawles' RPF Don't Fall In Love With A Homo featuring fictional Zachary Quinto loving on fictional Zoe Saldana (you heard me, StarNerds). I don't intend Plagiarism, I intend Tribute: I think Rawles asked some Interesting Questions with her fiction, and they turned out to be the same shades of Interesting Questions I wanted to ask about Raj and Howard. Namely, how do two heterosexually (occasionally) active guys feel about Getting It On with each other?


End file.
